On the road at Northern Illinois, Nebraska football struggled to put away the Huskies. Here are three takeaways from the Cornhuskers loss against NIU.
For the second straight week, Nebraska fell in a road game on Saturday. This time, instead of falling to Pac-12 hopefuls Oregon, they stumbled against a MAC school. Northern Illinois secured a 21-17 statement win in what looks to be a wide-open MAC West competition this season.
It was a sad performance for Mike Riley’s team as they struggled on the road. They came to DeKalb as a 10.5-point favorite, but made some costly mistakes throughout the game that cost them victory. Now Nebraska falls under .500 on the season after the upset, and looks like a pretender in the Big Ten West race before their conference season even begins.
After Saturday began with this big upset, here are three takeaways from Nebraska’s loss at Northern Illinois.
3. Tanner Lee isn’t reading the field well at quarterback
We talked about it a bit already at halftime, but Tanner Lee simply doesn’t look like the answer at quarterback for Nebraska. He finished the game with 25completions on 47 passing attempts, throwing for 299 yards. But his two early pick-sixes proved costly, keeping Northern Illinois in a game where they were otherwise shut down on offense. He atoned a bit with two rushing touchdowns, but threw a third pick late in the fourth quarter when Nebraska was still in range to win.
The former Tulane recruit entered the game completing just 52 percent of his passes with a 6.7 yards-per-attempt average. Lee is little more than a caretaker quarterback for Mike Riley’s offense, but if he can’t take care of the ball it begs the question as to whether he deserves to remain the starter.
Of course, that also begs the question of who Nebraska could possibly have on the depth chart to step up for the Cornhuskers. A pair of freshman, Patrick O’Brien and Tristan Gebbia, sit behind Lee on the depth chart. Would Riley and offensive coordinator Danny Langsdorf consider throwing O’Brien or Gebbia to the fire in a season that is beginning to go off the rails?
What we do know is that Lee is not playing as well as Nebraska needs from its quarterback. The veteran now has more interceptions than touchdowns between the four he threw in Autzen Stadium against Oregon and the three he tossed this week against Northern Illinois.
3. Strong play by the defense kept Nebraska in the game
Nebraska fell for the second straight week. For the Cornhuskers, the second loss hurts even more after coming against a Group of Five program. But while Mike Riley has plenty of questions to ask about his offense, the Blackshirts defense was once again solid in defeat.
Northern Illinois managed fewer than 250 total yards of offense and just one touchdown when they had the ball. The defensive backfield scored more touchdowns than NIU’s offensive backfield on Saturday.
While Nebraska is reeling after falling under .500 in the season standings, their concerns rest almost entirely on one side of the ball. They were unable to force a turnover by Northern Illinois, one place where Nebraska could improve defensively. But in general the Cornhuskers had a solid performance stifling the Huskies when they had the ball.
In the past six quarters, Nebraska’s defense has allowed just one touchdown. They shut out Oregon after halftime in a thwarted comeback bid in Eugene, and nearly pitched a shutout against the Huskies on the road.
3. Tre Bryant loss really hurt the Nebraska offense Saturday
Nebraska struggled to pass the ball effectively, in part, because they struggled to run the ball effectively. The Cornhuskers managed just 2.4 yards per carry, finishing as a team with 85 rushing yards on 36 carries. It was an ugly performance by the backfield that illuminated just how much Tre Bryant meant to Nebraska’s hopes for a successful 2017 campaign.
Bryant had ran for over 100 yards in each of his first two games of the season. But against Oregon, Bryant injured his knee and was forced to leave the game early. Unable to start in Week 3, the Nebraska running game struggled to gain purchase against a MAC front seven without their star running back in the lineup.
Mikale Wilbon wasn’t terrible after getting the start for the injured Bryant, running 24 times for 90 yards. It was the rest of the team that failed to pick up the slack. Tanner Lee managed to run for two touchdowns, but also took several sacks that dropped his rushing averages for the game. The bench got only five carries in relief of Wilbon, as the Cornhuskers were forced to pass the ball as they played catch-up against the Huskies.
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If Bryant cannot come back to the field any time soon, Nebraska will be in real trouble heading into Big Ten play.